Google Docs and The Cloud

2011-12-28T13:44:00.001-08:00

        There are a lot of features that Google has come up with lately. We know Google for the search engine. We know it because now a days we hear in movies, blogs, web pages and conversations "Google it" or "Google is your best friend". Google has become so important on our searches that we automatically type "google.com" the instance we want to get out from a page. Now, Google doesn't only do searching. Google has become such an important part of our lives that we foresee the whole picture.

        Google Mail or GMail. I was one of the users that was on closed beta when Google released GMail. To that point I was hooked and deciding between Yahoo's hard to use UI and Hotmail's boring looks. When I heard about GMail I desperately went through forums looking for an invitation. After a week or so of looking I finally got an invitation. My first impression was "bye bye Hotmail and Yahoo" (not quite, because I still have the accounts). Ever since GMail has been in a rising curve and every new change makes it better and better.

        Google also does maps. Who doesn't or hasn't ever used Google maps to look up an address, or went on Google Earth to search your town from the sky? If we remember right before Google Maps there was Yahoo Maps and Mapquest. Mapquest? Yahoo Maps? I haven't used this services ever since Google started the maps service.

        Then came Google Docs. What is Google Docs? Well, Google decided to compete versus the software giant Microsoft and its Office bundle (Word, Excel, PowerPoint). Is not that Microsoft has never had competition, we can remember that OpenOffice does that. Every GMail user has access to this service and your email as for every service that Google has come up with is your log in key. Google Docs has come up a long way. Yet the service is so user to user bonded that is just incredible. Creation of documents is straight forward. You just press create and choose between a document, spreadsheet, presentation, a form, a drawing or a table.

        So, you decide to create a document and blah it isn't really the big difference between Microsoft's Office and Google Docs. Well look again. Every document is saved in Google's cloud. Google's cloud? Yes, Google's cloud. It's a service that Google does not mention a lot but is there. You save something and it is available everywhere you sign in. All your Google Docs are "on the go". The cloud also gives you the option to save Music with Google Music, photos with Picasa. Well since the files are in a cloud sharing is the easiest thing known to mankind. We now have the option to create the file at home and open it at any computer with internet access and there is no need of any software to be installed in the computer except the internet browser.

        Once a file is saved you can share it as a public file where anyone can see it and you decide if they can view it only, comment on it or have full editing privileges. Now if you want to share it but only to certain people, then you can make it public but only to the people that have the link. You send an email to the people and with the link they can access and again you give the editing privileges you want. Now, if you are concern that the file can end up on the wrong hands, you can make it private and sharing is still possible, but the person you share it with needs to log in with its own GMail account. And again you can give this people the editing privileges you want.

        Imagine sending an essay to your college English instructor. He/she receives the essay and comments on it because that is the only privilege you gave to the file. You then a day after decide to go back into the Google Docs page at a Starbucks with your laptop to find an essay with a grade at the bottom and full of comments, yet the essay itself is intact. Imagine the possibilities. This also goes for group projects where coworkers/students do not have the means to get together, and Google Docs gives them a way to share there work.

        So we come to find that Google is constantly working on offering the end users (us) exciting products and new ways of communication. From smartphones to search engines, and Google Docs is only one of many of Google's nifty software tools.

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Google Docs and The Cloud